Well, I'm a little late with this installment
of the EF, but I figure that prolonging the inevitable is exactly what
we all need right about now. Anything we can possibly do to take away the
mind-numb fact that yes, we only have three more episodes to go. I'll say
it again, man this sucks.

But one thing that didn't suck was
this episode. Hats off to Steve Binder for coming back and really making
his last eppie count. You need an episode like this for these kinds of
shows. Our hero loses his powers and discovers how much he really needed
them. I'm just surprised we got this far without it. All in all, this episode
really shaped up to be a good one. But you're not here to hear what I think
of the finished product! You want the backstory, what went on behind the
scenes. So, let¹s take a gander...

* I thought it was odd that Michael
G. directed this one and the next one. According to my script, MM is supposed
to be episode 18. I believe that they were switched because their underlying
themes were more compatible with the last episode's...but I've said too
much.

* Adieu France! According to my French
contacts, I-Man has wrapped already in France. I couldn't understand why
they were telling me how much they like the shoe-shine sequence since it
hadn't aired. Then I remembered that Sci-fi wisely breaks up the rhythm
of the season and scatters it over the course of the year (22 episodes
over 52 weeks?).

* Speaking of French, bone up on yours
and purchase the thus-far only official merchandise of I-man, the French
DVD. You can get it at Amazon.fr, pay for it in dollars and they ship it
here! I was amazed at the care and attention they put into the dvd. The
menu selection is all CGI and has all sorts of little goodies. The downside
(Warning!) Is that it will not play on American DVD players. Set your computer's
DVD player to the European region (My Mac G4 did it automatically) and
Viola, you can see what I'm talking about. Watch the show in French, then
enjoy it in English with the French subtitles (oh crap=merde!)

* The “Babes of Baywatch” was an obvious
poke of fun at Brandy¹s former job. I was wrong when I thought that
she wasn't in any more episodes, but this one is her last one. Funny, after
all the controversy, she really seemed to be finding the niche in this
show.

* '222 Eberts road' was an ad-lib by
Paul.

* The Hotel St. James is located in
downtown San Diego.

* In the script, I¹m giving the
Official a manicure. None of us like that, so Michael came up with the
shining of the shoe. Eddie suggested that he be stretched out, naked on
the desk with only a towel covering him and I¹m giving him a back
massage. He was joking, of course.

* The blah, blah, blah scenes. I always
remember how the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation would complain
about having to recite all that mindless technobabble. I couldn¹t
believe how jaded they were; they were on a hit TV show and yet they were
complaining. This episode made both Shannon and I retract that thought.
Hitchcock called it the “Mcguffin”, the thing that drives the plot. It
really didn't matter what it was, stolen diamonds, dangerous virus, plans
for the death star, all that mattered is that it put our heroes into harms
way and made it cool to watch. Well, Shannon and I were responsible for
various “Mcguffins” on the show over the last two seasons, and this one
kind of did us in. Mind you, it wasn¹t that it was stupid or anything,
far from it. Rather, it was a wordy, complicated scene that we weren¹t
entirely ready for. Shannon had the brunt of the pain, her remedy was her
clip-board with a strategically placed script. I paraphrased to save myself,
taking full credit for introducing the word “Oshimmy” into the I-Man lexicon.
While it¹s true that this episode broke us, we will both miss those
scenes.

* Steve was so happy to finally get
one of his story ideas accepted so that he could finally write me in. If
you'll recall(I certainly did!) both of Steve's
first season scripts were sans Eberts. He explained that out of the eight
pitches he gave to the producers, the only two they bought didn't have
Eberts in them. I had remained sceptical until I got this script. When
Steve was on set he made a point of honestly asking if I had enough to
do in the script. He felt bad about the previous scripts and wanted to
make up for it.

* Steve wrote me in so many scenes
that I actually voluntarily left one. When the Official, Hobbes and Alex
are talking about getting Darien back, I was supposed to be there. Well,
we had been shooting a lot of stuff that day and I was dead tired. Michael
G's camera work called for a three person scene and then a shot of me somewhere.
We both just looked at each other and decided that since I had no lines,
maybe I could just go home. I suppose you can chalk that up to being jaded
too, because I would have killed to be in any extra scene in the first
year.

* The miniature golf place has an arcade
that was seen in “Exposed”.

* The coolest shot this show or any
in SD has ever had: the Coronado Bridge connects downtown San Diego to
the island of Coronado (actually, they created a strait in the early 20th
century to connect the island with SSD, but that¹s another story.).
Over 2 miles long and 200 feet above water, the bungie jump took place
here. The only bad thing was that the actor who played the bungie instructor
had 66% of his lines cut (“..2...1!”). Of course Vinny did not perform
that jump and his scene actually took place on Stu's backlot. But it was
cool.

As you have noticed by now, I did indeed
decide to do the chat. After laying into the publicist about how poorly
I was treated by the network on this show I realized that I would only
be doing a disservice to you guys by not chatting one last official time.
I tried to get Sci-fi to pay for a wrap party for us, but that had predictable
results. Vinny is aware of the time difference problem with his Friday
chat and will try to instruct the moderator not to let any spoiling questions
happen.

So I guess that's it. I'm so behind
that I'm already due for a “Possessed” file. As always, thanks for tuning
in!